Should Our Children Have to Struggle in Life?

“Coming to America” is one of my personal favorite movies. Mainly because of Eddie Murphy’s character, Prince Akeem. In the movie, it is time for him to choose a bride. He tells Arsenio Hall, who plays Semmi, his personal servant/trainer that he wants “a woman who not only stimulates his loins, but also his mind.”

I got to thinking about another scene in that movie recently. John Amos as Cleo McDowell tells his daughter Lisa, played by Shari Headly that she should seriously consider marrying Darryl, played by Eriq LaSalle because he's rich. His parents have made a fortune with some greasy hair product. Lisa would never have to work or struggle the way he and his wife did. He wanted her to have it easier. At first glance, this is a sweet thought. Upon further reflection, I start wondering if that’s really so sweet.

When you really think about it, the struggles we go through in life are a huge part of who we are today. They teach us persistence and endurance.  They also show us how much we care about whatever it is we’re trying to accomplish. Sometimes they help us find something we’re passionate about. Struggling also helps us discover strength and endurance that can be used all our lives.

Knowing this makes me wonder why we think it’s so great to make things easier for our children. When we make things easier for our children, even with the best of intentions, we’re telling them they don’t need to struggle. We’re teaching them to look for an easy way to do things.  In the long run, when we don’t allow our children to struggle with things, then we’re not teaching them persistence and endurance. So much in life depends on being able to persist and endure when things don’t go the way we expect.

Also, this could and should teach them to ask for help when they truly need it. In so many ways, we’re the primary teachers of life lessons to our children. So, when we try to make things easier for our children because we don’t think they should have to struggle the way we did, what are we really teaching them?

Chocolate Fiend

Recently, I inadvertently created a chocolate fiend in my house. How did I do that you ask? Well, it’s simple. Let me start at the beginning. . .

I get the occasional craving for chocolate, as most of us do, but when it started getting to be a fairly frequent thing, I started keeping some on hand for those times. It’s better than eating all the chocolate chips I need for baking cookies. I would buy coconut bon bons and some dark chocolate covered mint or some peanut butter cups at the local Trader Joe’s. Once in a while I’d buy dark chocolate nonpareils, which are small chocolate disks with little sugar balls on the bottom. Then my roommate asked if he could have some of my chocolates. Next thing I know, he’s wanting to share my personal chocolate supply. From then on we bought him a supply of his own.

I used to drink coffee, but can no longer tolerate it, so I switched to Hot Chocolate for the days when I need some “caffeine.” Hey, if you can’t have caffeine a sugar rush will do. Shortly after doing so, my roommate asked me to fix him some hot cocoa as he was cold. Okay, no problem. I went into the kitchen, heated some milk and added the appropriate amount of hot cocoa mix to his cup. When the milk was hot, I poured it in while stirring the powder so that the two became one. I then presented him with the finished product. He drank it and declared it so good, that I had to teach him how to do it for himself.

Okay, I know, you’re thinking “that’s not enough to make a chocolate fiend” and you’re right. It’s not. However, since I’ve taught him to make his own cocoa, he drinks at least one cup a day. I barely drink it twice a week. I’ve had to stock up on so much cocoa mix that I almost might as well buy stock in the company. I have cocoa mix in my cupboard and the pantry and even on my dining room table in an effort to keep enough on hand for him (just kidding about the dining room table, but my pantry does contain several cans of the mix).

Now if that wasn’t bad enough, I made the mistake of sharing part of my pound plus Belgian 72% Dark Chocolate bar with him. Now he wants to eat that too. Thankfully, I can keep it hidden and he knows better than to look for it. The problem is that every time I want to eat some, I either have to disappoint him because I don’t want to share it (it is mine, after all) or skip eating it. Actually not eating it isn’t too bad as I do need to lose some weight, but . . . sigh. . .

I told him that next time we go shopping we’re going to have to buy him one. He agreed. Hopefully, I won’t have to worry about my chocolate supply after that.